How Bal Thackeray threw the INS Vikrant a lifeline
Sandeep Unnithan | Mail Today | Mumbai, November 18, 2012 | UPDATED 15:33 IST
The Vikrant had been retired from the navy two years earlier. The navy wanted the state government to convert it into a museum but it would take the project at least five years to materialise. The warship could not wait this out without a refurbishment because its aging hull would be constantly exposed to the corrosive seawater. The navy had estimated it cost at least Rs.6 crore to dry-dock the carrier and refurbish its hull so it could wait out the project period.
The navy already had a hard time explaining to the auditors why they clung on to a retired ship. "Besides," one naval officer in the western naval command told me, "if the state government is serious about the project, let them pay," he said.
Our campaign had been on for over a year and it seemed things were moving forward. Then chief minister Manohar Joshi indicated he was in favor of converting the warship into a museum. But in February 1999, the ambitious Narayan Rane took over as CM.
Rane made his disdain for the project known. The navy got the message. They green-lighted the auction. On June 7, the the state-owned Metals and Minerals Trading Corporation, put newspaper advertisements calling bids for the historic ship. It seemed the campaign had been lost. The auction had gone through despite intervention at the highest levels: Bal Thackeray had asked his old friend George Fernandes, to stall the auction.
But the Kargil conflict that was then underway had Fernandes' complete attention. On July 8, the Vikrant was auctioned. The highest bid, for Rs.5.8 crore came from Haryana Shipbreakers. The mood in office was downcast particularly because we had invested so much effort in the campaign.
That day, we had to solve the mystery of how the auction had gone through. We decided to go and meet Bal Thackeray. I remember dashing down to our photo department and looking for Mohan Bane. A quiet unassuming photographer with a graying beard and a wealth of contacts.
A few minutes later, I was on the pillion of his motorcycle barreling towards Matoshree, in Kalanagar, Bandra (East). We were soon ushered past an endless series of rooms studded with Maratha iconography, Shivaji calendars, busts, crowds of followers, scattered slippers on the marble floor and even a silver throne with lions on its armrests. The Sena supremo sat on a sofa deep inside Matoshree. He was wearing his trademark silk kurta and lungi, his clean-shaved face framed with thick large 70s style eyeglasses. A large portrait of his wife Meenatai hung on the wall behind him.
Thackeray regarded Bane with affection and welcomed him. I sat down beside him, opened a file and explained the story. Thackeray listened patiently and nodded his head. His personal physician, Dr Nitu Mandke had told him of the enormous tourist potential it had for the city.
When Thackeray heard of the state government's recalcitrance, something seemed to snap inside him. "They are destroying their mothers," he growled. "Such people are not fit to rule the country." I didn't know who 'they' was. I didn't ask. But his ire was directed at his state government. Thackeray called for his telephone and the chief minister to meet him. There was no question of the auction going through, Thackeray later told us. The state government would pay the Rs.6.5 crores for refitting the warship, he said.
Bane then requested Thackeray to come on board the warship the following day for a photo-op. It was no ordinary photo op. Bane later told me this was to ensure the state government wouldn't back out.
Thackeray thought for a minute and then called for Champa Singh Thapa, his Marathi-speaking Nepali Man Friday. He asked Thapa to cancel his appointments for the next day. He was going on board the Vikrant, he said.
The Kargil war had triggered off patriotic fervor across the country. It would look good if the Sena supremo was seen on a powerful national symbol in his backyard.
Thackeray then lit a cigar and blew a few smoke rings of contentment. He asked me about my unusual surname, "South Indian?" He told me how much he admired former US President Isenhower, whose biography he had just put down. He was then lost in thought. It was time to go. We sought his leave, but Thackeray wasn't finished.
"I have a joke for you," he said. He narrated it poker-faced: Pramod Navalkar (a veteran Sena leader) was once travelling in an aircraft and introduced himself to his co-passenger as the culture minister of Maharashtra. "I'm the chief of the Nepal navy," his co passenger told him. "That's impossible," Navalkar said, 'Nepal doesn't have a navy.' 'If Maharashtra can have a culture minister, why can't Nepal have a navy?' the passenger asked. I remember laughing nervously. The Sena chief had a sense of humor after all. I later realized Thackeray, who had only a faint understanding of the navy, had wracked his brains to come up with a nautical-themed joke. It was a cartoonist's repartee.
(Epilogue- Bal Thackeray toured the INS Vikrant the following day. He was accompanied by the Chief Minister Rane and several state government officials. Rane announced the Rs.6.5 crore grant to repair the Vikrant. The ship is still in the naval dockyard Mumbai, as a museum thanks largely to the efforts of Thackeray and, subsequently, Vice Admiral Vinod Pasricha, the western naval commander in 2000. Successive state governments have yet to fulfill the promise of converting it into a permanent museum).
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